


la vie en rose

by fresh96



Category: ATEEZ (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Not K-Pop Idols, Comedy, Drinking, Falling In Love, Fluff, Lighthearted, M/M, Romance, accidentally wrote a sappy romance instead, alcohol use, rated t for language and mentions of sex, sanhwa, wrote this to practice writing comedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:48:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26316691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fresh96/pseuds/fresh96
Summary: Although Seonghwa has no training, he keeps up with San like a dream, like they were made for each other, and all San can think is maybe Hongjoong was right… We are the perfect couple.or,Sanhwa fall in love.
Relationships: Choi San/Park Seonghwa
Comments: 4
Kudos: 69





	la vie en rose

“I’m going to get fired.” San says over the top of his Frappuccino.

They’re sitting in Hongjoong’s café (closed for lunch, since Hongjoong and Yunho are the only employees), in the corner booth right next to the front window. Through the window San can just barely make out the writing on the windows of the shop across the street; they’re having a 2-for-1 sale on kitchen appliances. It’s mid-fall, and the morning air is just cold enough to slightly freeze the water falling from the dark heavy clouds. The sleet falls in fat droplets, pattering the window, lulling the four friends into a state of sluggish afternoon apathy.

“I’m _going_ to get fired.” San says again, before slurping at his Frappuccino and shivering.

“Why would you get fired, San?” Yunho doesn’t even look up from his phone as he speaks. “You’re their best employee. Who would they have teaching their beginners modern dance class if not you?”

“I’m going to get fired because I left my iced coffee on the floor and the condensation made the floor slick and one of my students slipped during class and her mother was rightly furious about it. Of course they’re going to fire me!”

Hongjoong and Wooyoung look at each other. “Correlation/Causation.” This was something San and Wooyoung had done since long before Hongjoong and Yunho had befriended them; ever since Mrs. Masters Composition class in the 8th grade when they’d learned about logical fallacies. At first it had just been a Wooyoung thing, but over time it became a competition over who could recognize their friends being stupid first. Not everyone was into it, but Hongjoong had taken to it like a bee to honey when they’d first explained it to him (after he witnessed a near fistfight over who was correct in the parking lot of a Costco).

“Besides,” Wooyoung continues, still staring Hongjoong down, “Even _if_ it was your fault, and that’s a big if, this is the first time you’ve messed up in over 3 years working there. They’ll definitely just warn you to be more careful in the future.”

San takes a deep breath and exhales very slowly, counting the seconds, and slurps his Frappuccino again. “I’m aware that I probably won’t get fired but can I please wallow in self-pity for a minute before you guys try to logic me out of this?”

“Oh, we’re throwing a pity party?” Wooyoung asks loudly, “I thought you had come here for some good old-fashioned knowledge. By all means continue.”

Yunho snorts into his mocha, and glances at Wooyoung incredulously. “If he had come here for knowledge, he certainly wouldn’t be asking you.”

Feeling a smile creeping onto his face, San puts on his best football announcer voice. “Foul on number 25! Unnecessary roughness. Five-yard penalty.”

Hongjoong puts his hands up. “Okay okay okay. You’re all very funny, but in all seriousness, San, I think you and your job will be fine. My café, on the other hand, might not if we stay closed for much longer. Yunho?” Yunho grunts and shoves up from the table, holstering his phone in his pocket and striding away.

“God that man is tall.” Hongjoong looks like he’s going to jump Yunho right there on the café floor but blinks out of it quickly to tell Wooyoung and San they’re welcome to stay for as long as they want. Wooyoung accepts less than graciously (he’s working on his Master’s right now, and needs all the café study time he can get), but San has a class to teach in a little bit, to a group of 6-year-olds on loan for an hour from a nearby preschool, so he thanks Hongjoong for the offer and heads for the door.

Just as his hand reaches the handle though, someone pushes inside roughly, knocking San backward and almost over. San looks up, preparing to unleash a can of whoop-ass on whoever was stupid enough to not look where they were going like that (the door is glass for god’s sake!) and is startled to see a very concerned pair of eyes perched atop one of the best looking men San’d ever seen (definitely top 5, he would later decide. After himself, of course).

“Shit- I mean, sorry. Are you okay?” The very kind eyed man also has a very nice voice, and to add insult to injury, San can’t actually bring himself to be mad at this dude.

“Yeah! Totally fine. No biggie.”

The man with the kind eyes and nice voice cringes a little. “Seriously, I cannot apologize enough for that. I really need to pay better attention.”

San notices the man’s jeans are acid wash. He likes them. “ _Seriously_ , you’re fine. Although, watching out is always a good idea. It might save more people shop from all of those coffee shop related fatalities we hear about on the news.”

“Someone died from slipping in a coffee shop last year in this very city.” The man says seriously, “It’s no laughing matter.”

“Oh. Um, sorry. Did you know them?”

“No. Actually I made that up. I’m a compulsive liar when I’m nervous.”

San doesn’t know what to say to that, so he decides to smile at the man, who smiles back a little, and then Wooyoung (master of terrible timing) groans from his spot in the corner and brings San back to reality.

“Well, I have to get to work. Have a nice day! Try not to push anymore people over!”

The man looks like if he had more time, he might want to say something else, but San really doesn’t want to be late for work, _especially_ today, so he brushes him aside and strides out the door. The sleet has not stopped while San was preoccupied, and instead of hating the feeling of it plopping into his hair, he finds that today he rather likes it. This is how San meets Seonghwa.

***

They’re standing in front of Hongjoong’s apartment door. Seonghwa has met Hongjoong, of course, multiple times, and he’s met all of San’s other friends at least once (San and Co. predictably _always_ hang out in Hongjoong’s café), but to have Seonghwa _here, invited to boardgame night_ , to spend an extended amount of time with the people he’s called his family for almost a decade now… well. San is a little nervous to say the least. It’s not that they won’t like Seonghwa, they absolutely will. Seonghwa is incredibly funny when he wants to be, and snarky when he doesn’t mean to be, and just overall very very nice, if not a little weird. They will love him. And to his credit, San thinks Seonghwa will love them too. He’s not a stick in the mud by any stretch, but he does tend to get overwhelmed and San’s friends are nothing if not overwhelming. But Seonghwa had insisted he would be fine and even protested when San had counter-insisted that they come up with some sort of code in case Seonghwa needed to escape, complete with lie to tell Hongjoong and everything. So, it would be fine. Probably. San is _manifesting_ that it will be fine.

Hongjoong’s door swings open after half a knock, if that’s possible, to reveal Mingi, tall, flushed, and definitely at least a third of the way to being drunk. To call this boardgame night might be a little pretentious. In reality, although there are boardgames out and they have been known to play them, it’s really just an excuse to get drunk like they did in college without the added stress of having to pay for Uber’s and five plus dollar shots. Luckily, San had foreseen this, and he clued Seonghwa in beforehand. Mingi pulls San into a big hug like they hadn’t seen each other only three days ago and looks at Seonghwa over San’s head. Seonghwa raises the bottle of _disgustingly_ expensive vodka he’d insisted on buying just for this occasion in lieu of a greeting and, to Seonghwa’s credit, Mingi seems to decide that’s good enough for him, and ushers the two inside before peeling the vodka out of Seonghwa’s hand and spiriting it away to the kitchen.

“Ahh. The mysterious boyfriend deigns to grace us with his presence at last.” Wooyoung is spinning in Hongjoong’s gaming chair, placed totally non-obviously right in the middle of the living room just for this moment. He’s also a little drunk though, by San’s guess, because he’s spinning non-stop, not just for dramatic timing.

Seonghwa deadpans. “You’ve met me.”

“Have we though?”

“Stop being mean to him 30 seconds after we arrive.” San gripes at Wooyoung, “You’re going to scare him away and then you’ll have to deal with broken-hearted San, and nobody wants that.”

Wooyoung opens his mouth with a grimace, but Seonghwa beats him to the punch. “If Wooyoung could scare me away, I wouldn’t be a very good boyfriend.” Wooyoung’s pained grimace turns to indignance.

“Why does everyone always say these things about me? I’m intimidating! I have half a master’s degree!”

“You’re going to be completely insufferable and make us address you as Dr. Jung when you graduate, aren’t you?” Yunho materializes out of the kitchen, with a drink in hand that looks suspiciously like Hongjoong’s famous Pink Panty Droppers.

“Yes, obviously. I would never get any respect in this establishment otherwise. I’m going to change my legal first name to Doctor, just so you can’t get around it.”

Yunho and Wooyoung are liable to banter at each other forever, especially since Yunho gets very chatty when he’s been drinking, so San takes Seonghwa’s coat, hangs it, and offers to show him around, like a good host (since the actual host is nowhere to be seen). San shows him Hongjoong’s bathroom (where he and Wooyoung had once slept off a blackout), he shows him Hongjoong’s hallway (littered with photos of their group of friends from the start of college until now), and he shows him Hongjoong’s room (so much more goth-ly decorated than one would expect out of Hongjoong, café owner, and Yunho, professional jock/prep). Showing off Hongjoong’s apartment to Seonghwa feels intimate somehow, like he’s showing Seonghwa a time machine into his life 5 years ago, when he slept here more often than not, ate only $5-dollar pizza, and drank only PBR. Since then, they had all graduated, San had gotten his dream job, Yunho and Hongjoong had moved in together, and Mingi and Wooyoung had both gone back to school. It seemed a lifetime away, but closed into Hongjoong’s little hallway with Seonghwa, it felt like they were living it together.

“Please don’t use my room for a quickie.” Hongjoong comments drily from behind the pair, and San jumps a foot in the air at the interruption.

“Good to see you Hongjoong.” Seonghwa replies, unperturbed as ever. San swears his brain wiring was mixed up at birth, because he knew from first-hand experience that certain colors of liquid struck fear into Seonghwa’s soul, but sudden interruptions into quiet moments were apparently nothing to consider at all.

“We weren’t going to use your room for a quickie.”

“We weren’t?” Seonghwa interjects from beside San, and San hits him lightly in the arm, eyes never leaving Hongjoong.

“No, we weren’t. We were going to use the bathroom like civilized people.”

“Good luck with that! Quickies in that bathroom don’t really hit like they used to, eh San?”

San sucks in his breath a little, unsure of how to proceed. Hongjoong is doing this to test Seonghwa, San knows that. And he respects the jab, but to be honest he’s not sure if Seonghwa will get it. Plus, San hasn’t really gotten around to the ‘sorry-but-just-fyi-ive-hooked-up-with-all-my-friends-more-than-once’ conversation with Seonghwa yet. It never really seemed important at first, and then he’d remembered on the way here that Hey, That Happened, and had wanted to prepare Seonghwa for the eventuality that some dumb drunk idiot would bring it up tonight, but how do you start that conversation? San didn’t know, so he hadn’t. He wishes now that he had though, and glares at Hongjoong a little through his lashes, before snaking his glance over to Seonghwa. To his credit, from the look on his face, Seonghwa had definitely gotten it, and didn’t seem all that bothered by it.

“All respect, Hongjoong,” Seonghwa says finally, and San swears he could see the snarky gleam in his eye from 10 miles away, “but bathroom quickies with _me_ are simply better.”

“He’s just built different.” San firmly agrees and squeezes Seonghwa’s hand with his as an apology. Seonghwa squeezes back.

Later, after everyone was good and toasted, and Mingi had almost put Wooyoung through a window over a game of Monopoly, Hongjoong gets his real comeuppance from Seonghwa. Hongjoong was perseverating over some damn thing he had seen on National Geographic, dead cultures or whatever, San hadn’t really been listening, talking on and on while leaning back into Yunho’s chest. Particularly agitated, Hongjoong said with finality “… And that’s why the Earth is fucked.”

Nothing could have ever prepared San for the look of wonder, grief, and respect that crossed over Hongjoong’s face when Seonghwa, without a moment’s hesitation, hit Hongjoong with the “Non-Sequitur.” They left a little after that, back to Seonghwa’s house, and as San watched the tiny snowflakes melt into Seonghwa’s windshield, Seonghwa’s hand’s firmly on the steering wheel, gaze straight ahead, San tiredly realized that this must be what it’s like to love someone.

***

San is really sweaty. He and Seonghwa are tucked in tight on the dancefloor, unbearably close together, and only mostly tolerably close to every other bar patron here tonight. He’s had only one drink, on purpose, because tonight all he really wanted was to dance with his man, and he wanted to remember it. Remarkably, Wooyoung and Seonghwa’s friend Yeosang have hit it off and are close by, but invisible, on the crowded dancefloor. Not everyone is out tonight; Mingi has his thesis defense tomorrow morning, so he opted out (but not before telling everyone in the group chat that he would never forgive them if they didn’t show up to cheer him on, regardless of hangover caliber). Elsewhere in the bar, Hongjoong and Yunho and Jongho (another addition by Seonghwa) are probably hustling some poor drunk fools at pool, which is pretty par for the course, San thinks. But again, that is not why he’s here tonight. He’s here tonight to dance.

San loves dancing. He has ever since he was little, before he even thought about making a career out of it. And he loves his job, he really does. If he can help even one kid love dancing as much San himself does, that will have been a job well done. Sometimes, though, he needs to get out and just dance for the fun of it, to remind himself why he likes it so much. To no one’s surprise, Seonghwa is as good at dancing as he is at everything else. Hongjoong had even shouted Seonghwa off the coffee table stage a few weeks earlier upon discovering this fact, citing that he couldn’t stand to be in the same room as that “talented, faultless couple” when they were just so blatantly showing off like this. Although Seonghwa has no training, he keeps up with San like a dream, like they were made for each other, and all San can think is _maybe Hongjoong was right… We are the perfect couple._

Close, in his ear, Seonghwa says “Okay, water break.” And peels away from San, not easing his hand off San’s though, and drags San through the crowd, back out to the bar. They spot Wooyoung and Yeosang as said bar, too close together to be platonic (“I didn’t think they would hit it off _that_ well.” Seonghwa says to him later), and they make their way over to the other pair, flagging down the bartender for two waters and a vodka soda, please.

The bar is absolutely packed tonight, it’s seriously wall-to-wall people, and maybe that’s what they get for going out on a Friday, but San is sort of loving it. He especially loves nights like this for eavesdropping on drunk people, who think they’re having deep conversations, but really, they’re just saying the same thing over and over.

“Seonghwa!” Wooyoung exclaims, wrapping his arms around Seonghwa’s middle, opposite San. “Just the man I wanted to see! Why would you ever keep a nice young man like Yeosang all to yourself? You can’t just take all the perfect, single men in the city and hide them away like you do Sannie.” He pouts.

Yeosang giggles from his seat at the bar, “Call me perfect again please. I’m close.”

A loud noise of disgust makes its way out of Seonghwa’s throat. “Please don’t inflate his ego more than it already is, Woo. I’m begging you.”

“Then beg.”

San laughs at that, completely at ease in the moment. Out of one eye, he sees a man yelling at Jongho, presumably for hustling him, and he begins to laugh even harder. Pointing this out to Seonghwa, his boyfriend scurries off to secure their friends and leave before anyone can start an actual bar fight, and San is left to fend for himself against the onslaught of the impossibly powerful duo that is Wooyoung and Yeosang. Even separately San fears their power, but together… He doesn’t even want to think of the implications this night might have on their future boardgame nights.

“So, San,” Yeosang starts, “Wooyoung was telling me all about the trouble you used to get up to here. What trouble have you been in tonight?” San was right. They’re exactly the same and a curse on the Earth.

“No trouble here! I’m respectably taken and well-mannered now.”

“Oh! Likely story.” Wooyoung scoffs at this, downing the rest of whatever drink he’s been nursing.

“That’s rich coming from you, Mr. I-will-blow-anyone-in-the-bathroom-for-a-frumph.” Wooyoung clamps his hands over San’s mouth, giving Yeosang a saccharine smile.

“San I will not hesitate to murk you right here.”

“Please don’t.” Seonghwa reappears, trail of friends in tow like ducklings, just in time to rescue San from Wooyoung’s grubby hands. “That would make me so sad. Plus, they always suspect the boyfriend first when these sort of things happen.”

“Gee thanks, Hwa.” San bats his eyes at Seonghwa animatedly, hoping to convey how much he wishes Seonghwa would try. His blackbelt has some things to say.

San notices Seonghwa’s hand is twitching a little, so San reaches down to grab it, and recognizing the tell he says quietly, privately “Ready to go?” Seonghwa shoots him a relieved glance and an imperceptible nod, and San can’t help but lean up to kiss him right there at the bar, surrounded by their friends and a bunch of strangers. They’ve had better kisses, worse too probably, but this one is borne out of the tight feeling in San’s heart that he feels whenever Seonghwa comes back into view or does something particularly Seonghwa-ish. It’s been building up all night, and Seonghwa’s impossibly expressive face tips over the container and floods San’s heart.

‘Well, you horrible bitches,” San starts and gets a chorus of ‘Hey!’ in protest, “it’s time for us to head home. I trust you all will stay out of trouble and spare us the 3am bail phone call?”

“That was one time!” Yunho grumps, and Hongjoong pats his shoulder sweetly.

“Go.” Says Hongjoong, nodding to the door, and so they do, finally exiting into the sweet, warm spring air. Seonghwa is silent on the walk back to the car, pensive, and San feels the container in his heart start to tip again. He tugs on Seonghwa’s hand a little, to get his attention. Seonghwa stops.

“Hey.” San says a little breathlessly, caught up in the way Seonghwa looks under the moonlight.

“Hey.”

“You know I love you right?”

A bright smile reemerges on Seonghwa’s face then, and he grabs San’s face in his hands, leaning down to pepper it with small kisses. “Always.” He kisses San for real then. Its head spinning and heart pounding, as it always is with Seonghwa, and San leans into it, hoping that if he loses himself enough, he’ll be able to live in this moment forever. Seonghwa eventually pulls away, pink-cheeked, and San can feel his lips tingle.

“I love you too.”

***

They get married on Halloween, three years after the first time they’d met, like Seonghwa insists. Between Hongjoong’s position as maid of honor, Seonghwa’s own goth proclivities, and the date of the event, it’s no surprise that San and Seonghwa end up with the laciest, gothiest, wedding San thinks he’s ever seen. He doesn’t mind though. In fact, with the way Yunho, Wooyoung, and Yeosang are crying, he thinks it’s probably perfect.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks again to neohs for having to put up with me complaining while writing constantly, and for bearing with me while i read the entire thing out loud to make sure it doesn't sound too stupid. you're a life saver. 
> 
> I wanted to write something funny, so I hope that came across even though I kinda get really introspective at times. Writing introspection is both my blessing and my curse. I actually really like how this went, even though I spent way less time on it than I usually do. Please leave me some feedback if you liked it or didn't or noticed a mistake I just would like to hear from you xoxo
> 
> I'm on twitter @dykeyibo if you want to come find me there :)


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